Branding Your Photography For The Holidays

Branding yourself and your business is one of the most important moves you can make. It not only makes you stand out from other photographers out there, it clearly carries out what you’re about and your overall message to potential clients. Branding can easily draw a line between success and failure. Your logo, business cards, website, social-media pages, promo material, down to the way you make your client feel, will all have an effect over a buyer or client’s decision to work with you or not.

The holidays, for example, are an excellent time to either re-brand, and make yourself stand out, whether it’s re-doing your website, or sending off a little reminder to your past/current clients so you can reconnect with them. Now, if it’s the latter, you don’t necessarily have to wait for December to reconnect; Valentine’s Day, Easter, their birthday, and all those other special occasions in between can provide a great opportunity to reach out and make yourself shine in the sea of photographers out there.

Branding as a whole can be dissected in so many different ways, but what you can apply towards branding your business around the holidays?

by Artifact Uprising

WEBSITE

Let’s start off with your website and body of work – as the holidays approach, you can give yours a special glow, perhaps highlighting holiday family portraits or children’s portraits– if that’s your niche. If you’re a food photographer, pictures of holiday baked goods are a good attention grabber, or if you’re a street photographer, maybe when folks visit your website, they’ll be graced with pictures of how different cities, countries, and people celebrate the holidays.

PRODUCTS

If you offer your clients a series of products throughout the year, maybe consider adding something special they can only get around the holidays: calendars to start the new year, holiday cards, post card packs, ornaments, etc. Artifact Uprising is one of my favorite companies, and they offer very minimalistic and eye-catching designs. Their holiday cards, for example, serve a 3-in-1 purpose as a greeting card, a photo print and a gift tag – all in one. Now, where else can your clients get something like that? You can check out all of Artifact Uprising’s products here.

Anthony and Hanssie were also able to visit the Artifact Uprising booth at PhotoPlus Expo and both were extremely impressed with the products they offer. They got a little demo at the booth:

Artifact Uprising 3-in-1 Card

PROMO-MATERIAL

With people being so busy all the time, it’s good to remind past clients what you offer. Perhaps you like to do themed mini-sessions and have some coming-up, or are offering a special discount at a certain time of the year, maybe boudoir photos around Valentine’s Day? Send your clients postcards, or a little note letting them know what you’re up to and what you’re offering; people always appreciate getting mail that’s not from their bank.

SOCIAL MEDIA

Use the holidays as an excuse to change things up and get creative! Change your cover photo, or spruce-up your logo with some holiday cheer. People are searching for the perfect gift left and right, you can recommend your favorites in a post. A big plus is reward your followers by doing a holiday giveaway (which, in turn, will also drive traffic to your page). The giveaway can range from one of your prints, to perhaps winning a portrait session.

There are so many possibilities for holiday branding, it’s definitely the perfect time to bust-out those creative chops and reconnect. I hope these have served as a little inspiration. What have you been doing differently this holiday season in regards to branding yourself?

CREDITS: All photographs by Artifact Uprising are copyrighted and have been used with permission for SLR Lounge. Do not copy, modify or re-post this article or images without express permission from SLR Lounge and the artist.

Michelle Bird is a Southern California based freelance photographer and writer, with a strong focus on music, editorial and portrait photography. She is the founder and creative force behind the music+culture online blog Black Vinyl Magazine, and can often be found in the photo-pit shooting the latest concerts in town. She has a strong passion for art, exploring, vintage finds and most of all animals. Connect with her through Email,Instagram , or Facebook

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